B    3    32b 


AVON'S    HARVEST 

EDWIN  ARLINGTON  ROBINSON 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


AVON'S  HARVEST 


BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 

Poems 

THE  CHILDREN  OF  THE  NIGHT 
CAPTAIN  CRAIG 
THE  TOWN  DOWN  THE  RIVER 
THE  MAN  AGAINST  THE  SKY 
MERLIN 
LANCELOT 
THE  THREE  TAVERNS 

Plays 

vVAN    ZORN.    A    COMEDY    IN    THREE 

ACTS 
THE  PORCUPINE.     A  DRAMA  IN  THREE 

ACTS 


AVON'S  HARVEST 


BY 
EDWIN  ARLINGTON  ROBINSON 


H3eto  gorfe 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
1921 

Att  rights  reserved 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

DAVIS 


COPYRIGHT,  1921, 
BY  THE  MAOMILLAN  COMPANY 

Set  up  and  electrotyped.     Published  March,  1921. 


TO 
SETH  ELLIS  POPE 


AVON'S  HARVEST 

Fear,  like  a  living  fire  that  only  death 

Might  one  day  cool,  had  now  in  Avon's  eyes 

Been  witness  for  so  long  of  an  invasion 

That  made  of  a  gay  friend  whom  we  had  known 

Almost  a  memory,  wore  no  other  name 

As  yet  for  us  than  fear.     Another  man 

Than  Avon  might  have  given  to  us  at  least 

A  futile  opportunity  for  words 

We  might  regret.     But  Avon,  since  it  happened, 

Fed  with  his  unrevealing  reticence 

The  fire  of  death  we  saw  that  horribly 


Consumed  him  while  he  crumbled  and  said  nothing. 

So  many  a  time  had  I  been  on  the  edge, 

And  off  again,  of  a  foremeasured  fall 

Into  the  darkness  and  discomfiture 

Of  his  oblique  rebuff,  that  finally 

My  silence  honored  his,  holding  itself 

Away  from  a  gratuitous  intrusion 

That  likely  would  have  widened  a  new  distance 

Already  wide  enough,  if  not  so  new. 

But  there  are  seeming  parallels  in  space 

That  may  converge  in  time;  and  so  it  was 

I   walked  with  Avon,   fought  and  pondered  with 

him, 

While  he  made  out  a  case  for  So-and-so, 
Or  slaughtered  What's-his-name  in  his  old  way, 
With  a  new  difference.     Nothing  in  Avon  lately 
Was,  or  was  ever  again  to  be  for  us, 
[2] 


Like  him  that  we  remembered;  and  all  the  while 

We  saw  that  fire  at  work  within  his  eyes 

And  had  no  glimpse  of  what  was  burning  there. 

So  for  a  year  it  went;  and  so  it  went 
For  half  another  year  —  when,  all  at  once, 
At  someone's  tinkling  afternoon  at  home 
I  saw  that  in  the  eyes  of  Avon's  wife 
The  fire  that  I  had  met  the  day  before 
In  his  had  found  another  living  fuel. 
To  look  at  her  and  then  to  think  of  him, 
And  thereupon  to  contemplate  the  fall 
Of  a  dim  curtain  over  the  dark  end 
Of  a  dark  play,  required  of  me  no  more 
Clairvoyance  than  a  man  who  cannot  swim 
Will  exercise  in  seeing  that  his  friend 
Off  shore  will  drown  except  he  save  himself. 
[3] 


To  her  I  could  say  nothing,  and  to  him 
No  more  than  tallied  with  a  long  belief 
That  I  should  only  have  it  back  again 
For  my  chagrin  to  ruminate  upon, 
Ingloriously,  for  the  still  time  it  starved; 
And  that  would  be  for  me  as  long  a  time 
As  I  remembered  Avon  —  who  is  yet 
Not  quite  forgotten.     On  the  other  hand, 
For  saying  nothing  I  might  have  with  me  always 
An  injured  and  recriminating  ghost 
Of  a  dead  friend.     The  more  I  pondered  it 
The  more  I  knew  there  was  not  much  to  lose, 
Albeit  for  one  whose  delving  hitherto 
Had  been  a  forage  of  his  own  affairs, 
The  quest,  however  golden  the  reward, 
Was  irksome  —  and  as  Avon  suddenly 
And  soon  was  driven  to  let  me  see,  was  needless. 
[4] 


it  seemed  an  age  ago  that  we  were  there 

One  evening  in  the  room  that  in  the  days 

When  they  could  laugh  he  called  the  Library. 

"  He  calls  it  that,  you  understand/'  she  said, 

"  Because  the  dictionary  always  lives  here. 

He's  not  a  man  of  books,  yet  he  can  read, 

And  write.     He   learned   it  all  at  school." — He 

smiled, 

And  answered  with  a  fervor  that  rang  then 
Superfluous :     "  Had  I  learned  a  little  more 
At  school,  it  might  have  been  as  well  for  me." 
And  I  remembered  now  that  he  paused  then, 
Leaving  a  silence  that  one  had  to  break. 
But  this  was  long  ago,  and  there  was  now 
No  laughing  in  that  house.     We  were  alone 
This  time,  and  it  was  Avon's  time  to  talk. 


5] 


I  waited,  and  anon  became  aware 
That  I  was  looking  less  at  Avon's  eyes 
Than  at  another  thing  that  had  a  gleam 
Quite  of  its  own.     "And  what  the  devil's  that?  " 
I  questioned. — "  Only  what  you  see,"  said  Avon ; 
"  Merely  a  dagger  on  a  dictionary. 
Daggers  are  out  of  date,  but  there  you  are. 
Take  it;  and  if  you  like  it,  shave  with  it." 

"If  that's  the  merry  best  that  you  can  do, 
My  friend,"  said  I,  willing  to  lay  it  back, 
"  I  recommend  that  you  be  serious." — 
"  You  are  the  judge  and  only  arbiter 
Of  that,"  said  he ;  "  and  that's  why  you  are  here. 
Your  name  is  Resignation  for  an  hour. 
So  be  resigned.     I  shall  not  praise  your  work, 
Or  strive  in  any  way  to  make  you  happy. 
[6] 


My  purpose  only  is  to  make  you  know 

How  clearly  I  have  known  that  you  have  known 

There  was  a  reason  waited  on  your  coming, 

And,  if  it's  in  me  to  see  clear  enough, 

To  fish  the  reason  out  of  a  black  well 

Where  you  see  only  a  dim  sort  of  glimmer 

That  has  for  you  no  light." 

"  I  see  the  well," 

I  said,  "  but  there's  a  doubt  about  the  glimmer  — 
Say  nothing  of  the  light.     I'm  at  your  service; 
And  though  you  say  that  I  shall  not  be  happy, 
I  shall  be  if  in  some  way  I  may  serve. 
To  tell  you  fairly  now  that  I  know  nothing 
Is  nothing  more  than  fair." — "  You  know  as  much 
As  any  man  alive  —  save  only  one  man, 
If  he's  alive.     Whether  he  lives  or  not 
Is  rather  for  time  to  answer  than  for  me; 

[7] 


And  that's  a  reason,,  or  a  part  of  one, 

For  your  appearance  here.     You  do  not  know  him, 

And  even  if  you  should  pass  him  in  the  street 

He  might  go  by  without  your  feeling  him 

Between  you  and  the  world.     I  cannot  say 

For  sure  he  would,  but  I  suppose  he  might." 

"  And  I  suppose  you  might,  if  urged,"  I  said, 
"  Say  in  what  water  it  is  that  we  are  fishing. 
You  that  have  reasons  hidden  in  a  well, 
Daggers  on  dictionaries,  men  that  walk 
The  streets  and  are  not  either  dead  or  living 
For  company,  are  surely,  one  would  say 
To  be  forgiven  if  you  may  seem  distraught  — 
I  mean  distrait.     I  don't  know  what  I  mean. 
I  only  know  that  I  am  at  your  service, 
And  that  your  ornament  there  on  the  book 
[8] 


Is  not  at  all  a  proper  toy  for  children. 

We're  not  exactly  in  the  nursery  now, 

I  know  —  though  I  may  soon  be  there  myself. 

Unless  your  living  dead  man  comes  to  life, 

Or  is  less  indiscriminately  dead, 

I  shall  go  home." 

"  No.  you  will  not  go  home," 
Said  Avon;  "or  I  beg  that  you  will  not." 
So  saying,  he  went  slowly  to  the  door 
And    turned    the    key.     "  Forgive    me    and    my 

manners, 

But  I  would  be  alone  with  you  this  evening. 
The  key,  as  you  observe,  is  in  the  lock; 
And  you  may  sit  between  me  and  the  door, 
Or  where  you  will.     And  if  that  thing  annoys  you, 
Take  it,  and  hide  it.     I'm  not  using  it. 
[9] 


It's  there  merely  by  way  of  illustration." 

"If  there  are  to  be  many  of  them  like  that, 
We'll  as  well  have  your  tale  without  your  pic 
tures,'* 

I  told  him.     "  I  am  not  much  given  to  nerves, 
But  that  thing  savors  of  experience 
Too  surely,  and  of  active  intimacies 
Too  sharply.     But  no  matter;  the  Lord  giveth, 
The  Lord  taketh  away.     I  trust  myself 
Always  to  you  and  to  your  courtesy. 
Only  remember  that  I  cling  somewhat 
Affectionately  to  the  old  tradition." — 
"I  understand  you  and  your  part,"  said  Avon; 
"And  I  dare  say  it's  well  enough,  tonight, 
We  play  around  the  circumstance  a  little. 
I've  read  of  men  that  half  way  to  the  stake 
[10] 


Would  have  their  little  joke.     It's  well  enough; 
Rather  a  waste  of  time,  but  well  enough." 

I  listened  as  I  waited,  and  heard  steps 
Outside  of  one  who  paused  and  then  went  on; 
And,  having  heard,  I  might  as  well  have  seen 
The  fear  in  his  wife's  eyes.     He  gazed  away. 
As  I  could  see,  in  helpless  thought  of  her, 
And  said  to  me:     "Well,  then,  it  was  like  this. 
Some  tales  will  have  a  deal  of  going  back 
In  them  before  they  are  begun.     But  this  one 
Begins  in  the  beginning  —  when  he  came. 
I  was  a  boy  at  school,  sixteen  years  old, 
And  on  my  way,  in  all  appearances, 
To  mark  an  even-tempered  average 
Among  the  major  mediocrities 
Who  serve  and  earn  with  no  especial  noise 
[11] 


Or  vast  reward.     I  saw  myself,  even  then, 
A  light  for  no  high  shining;  and  I  feared 
No  boy  or  man  —  having,  in  truth,  no  cause. 
I  was  enough  a  leader  to  be  free, 
And  not  enough  a  hero  to  be  jealous. 
Having  eyes  and  ears,  I  knew  that  I  was  envied, 
And  as  a  proper  sort  of  compensation 
Had  envy  of  my  own  for  two  or  three  — 
But  never  felt,  and  surely  never  gave, 
The  wound  of  any  more  malevolence 
Than  decent  youth,  defeated  for  a  day, 
May  take  to  bed  with  him  and  kill  with  sleep. 
So,  and  so  far,  my  days  were  going  well, 
And  would  have  gone  so,  but  for  the  black  tiger 
That  many  of  us  fancy  is  in  waiting, 
But  waits  for  most  of  us  in  fancy  only. 
For  me  there  was  no  fancy  in  his  coming, 
[12] 


Though  God  knows  I  had  never  summoned  him, 
Or  thought  of  him.     To  this  day  I'm  adrift 
And  in  the  dark,  out  of  all  reckoning, 
To  find  a  reason  why  he  ever  was, 
Or  what  was  ailing  Fate  when  he  was  born 
On  this  alleged  God-ordered  earth  of  ours. 
Now  and  again  there  comes  one  of  his  ilk  — 
By  chance,  we  say.     I  leave  all  that  to  you. 
Whether  it  was  an  evil  chance  alone, 
Or  some  invidious  juggling  of  the  stars, 
Or  some  accrued  arrears  of  ancestors 
Who  throve  on  debts  that  I  was  here  to  pay, 
Or  sins  within  me  that  I  knew  not  of, 
Or  just  a  foretaste  of  what  waits  in  hell 
For  those  of  us  who  cannot  love  a  worm, — 
Whatever  it  was,  or  whence  or  why  it  was, 
One  day  there  came  a  stranger  to  the  school. 
[13] 


And  having  had  one  mordacious  glimpse  of  him 
That  filled  my  eyes  and  was  to  fill  my  life, 

I  have  known  Peace  only  as  one  more  word 

Among  the  many  others  we  say  over 

That  have  an  airy  credit  of  no  meaning. 

One  of  these  days,  if  I  were  seeing  many 

To  live,  I  might  erect  a  cenotaph 

To  Job's  wife.     I  assume  that  you  remember; 

If  you  forget,  she's  extant  in  your  Bible." 

Now  this  was  not  the  language  of  a  man 
Whom  I  had  known  as  Avon,  and  I  winced 
Hearing  it  —  though  I  knew  that  in  my  heart 
There  was  no  visitation  of  surprise. 
Unwelcome  as  it  was,  and  off  the  key 
Calamitously,  it  overlived  a  silence 
That  was  itself  a  story  and  affirmed 
[14] 


A  savage  emphasis  of  honesty 

That  I  would  only  gladly  have  attuned 

If  possible,  to  vinous  innovation. 

But  his  indifferent  wassailing  was  always 

Too  far  within  the  measure  of  excess 

For  that;  and  then  there  were  those  eyes  of  his. 

Avon  indeed  had  kept  his  word  with  me, 

And  there  was  not  much  yet  to  make  me  happy. 

"  So  there  we  were/'  he  said,  *'  we  two  together, 
Breathing  one  air.     And  how  shall  I  go  on 
To  say  by  what  machinery  the  slow  net 
Of  my  fantastic  and  increasing  hate 
Was  ever  woven  as  it  was  around  us? 
I  cannot  answer;  and  you  need  not  ask 
What  undulating  reptile  he  was  like, 
For  such  a  worm  as  I  discerned  in  him 
[15] 


Was  never  yet  on  earth  or  in  the  ocean, 
Or  anywhere  else  than  in  my  sense  of  him. 
Had  all  I  made  of  him  been  tangible, 
The  Lord  must  have  invented  long  ago 
Some  private  and  unspeakable  new  monster 
Equipped  for  such  a  thing's  extermination; 
Whereon  the  monster,  seeing  no  other  monster 
Worth  biting,  would  have  died  with  his  work  done. 
There's  a  humiliation  in  it  now, 
As  there  was  then,  and  worse  than  there  was  then; 
For  then  there  was  the  boy  to  shoulder  it 
Without  the  sickening  weight  of  added  years 
Galling  him  to  the  grave.     Beware  of  hate 
That  has  no  other  boundary  than  the  grave 
Made  for  it,  or  for  ourselves.     Beware,  I  say; 
And  I'm  a  sorry  one,  I  fear,  to  say  it, 
Though  for  the  moment  we  may  let  that  go. 
[16] 


And  while  I'm  interrupting  my  own  story 
I'll  ask  of  you  the  favor  of  a  look 
Into  the  street.     I  like  it  when  it's  empty. 
There's  only  one  man  walking?     Let  him  walk. 
I  wish  to  God  that  all  men  might  walk  always, 
And  so,  being  busy,  love  one  another  more." 

"  Avon,"  I  said,  now  in  my  chair  again, 
"  Although  I  may  not  be  here  to  be  happy, 
If  you  are  careless,  I  may  have  to  laugh. 
I  have  disliked  a  few  men  in  my  life, 
But  never  to  the  scope  of  wishing  them 
To  this  particular  pedestrian  hell 
Of  your  affection.     I  should  not  like  that. 
Forgive  me,  for  this  time  it  was  your  fault." 

He  drummed  with  all  his  fingers  on  his  chair, 
[17] 


And,  after  a  made  smile  of  acquiescence, 

Took  up  again  the  theme  of  his  aversion, 

Which  now  had  flown  along  with  him  alone 

For  twenty  years,  like  lo's  evil  insect, 

To  sting  him  when  it  would.     The  decencies 

Forbade  that  I  should  look  at  him  for  ever, 

Yet  many  a  time  I  found  myself  ashamed 

Of  a  long  staring  at  him,  and  as  often 

Essayed  another  focus,  preferably 

That  least  engaging  of  exotic  steel, 

Which  in  the  distance,  on  the  dictionary, 

Shone,  I  conceived,  with  something  of  the  fire 

That  lived  in  Avon's  eye.     At  other  times 

There  might  be  cold  things  creeping  in  my  hair, 

At    which    my    scalp    would    shrink, —  at    which, 

again, 

I  would  arouse  myself  with  a  vain  scorn, 
[18] 


Remembering  that  all  this  was  in  New  York  — 
As  if  that  were  somehow  the  banishing 
For  ever  of  all  unseemly  presences  — 
And  listen  to  the  story  of  my  friend, 
Who,  as  I  feared,  was  not  for  me  to  save, 
And,  as  I  knew,  knew  also  that  I  feared  it. 

"  Humiliation,"  he  began  again. 
"  May  be  or  not  the  best  of  all  bad  names 
I  might  employ;  and  if  you  scent  remorse, 
There  may  be  growing  such  a  flower  as  that 
In  the  unsightly  garden  where  I  planted, 
Not  knowing  the  seed  or  what  was  coming  of  it. 
I've  done  much   wondering  if   I   planted   it; 
But  our  poor  wonder,  when  it  comes  too  late, 
Fights  with  a  lath,  and  one  that  solid  fact 
Breaks  while  it  yawns  and  looks  another  way 
[19] 


For  a  less  negligible  adversary. 
Away  with  wonder,  then;  though  I'm  at  odds 
With  conscience,  even  tonight,  for  good  assurance 
That  it  was  I,  or  chance  and  I  together, 
Did  all  that  sowing.     If  I  seem  to  you 
To  be  a  little  bitten  by  the  question, 
Without  a  miracle  it  might  be  true; 
The  miracle  is  to  me  that  I'm  not  eaten 
Long  since  to  death  of  it,  and  that  you  sit 
With  nothing  more  agreeable  than  a  ghost. 
If  you  had  thought  a  while  of  that,  you  might, 
Unhappily,  not  have  come;  and  your  not  coming 
Would  have  been  desolation  —  not  for  you, 
God  save  the  mark !  —  for  I  would  have  you  here. 
I  shall  not  be  alone  with  you  to  listen; 
And  I  should  be  far  less  alone  tonight 
With  you  away,  make  what  you  will  of  that. 
[20] 


I  said  that  we  were  going  back  to  school, 

And  we  may  say  that  we  are  there  —  with  him. 

This  fellow  had  no  friend,  and,  as  for  that, 

No  sign  of  an  apparent  need  of  one, 

Save  always  and  alone  —  myself.     He  fixed 

His  heart  and  eyes  on  me,  insufferably, — 

And  in  a  sort  of  Nemesis-like  way, 

Invincibly.     Others  who  might  have  given 

A  welcome  even  to  him,  or  I'll  suppose  so  — 

Adorning  an  unfortified  assumption 

With  gold  that  might  come  off  with  afterthought  — 

Got  never,  if  anything,  more  out  of  him 

Than  a  word  flung  like  refuse  in  their  faces, 

And    rarely    that.     For    God    knows    what    good 

reason, 

He  lavished  his  whole  altered  arrogance 
On  me;  and  with  an  overweening  skill, 
[211 


Which  had  sometimes  almost  a  cringing  in  it, 

Found  a  few  flaws  in  my  tight  mail  of  hate 

And  slowly  pricked  a  poison  into  me 

In  which  at  first  I  failed  at  recognizing 

An  unfamiliar  subtle  sort  of  pity. 

But  so  it  was,  and  I  believe  he  knew  it; 

Though     even    to     dream    it    would    have    been 

absurd  — 

Until  I  knew  it,  and  there  was  no  need 
Of  dreaming.     For  the  fellow's  indolence, 
And  his  malignant  oily  swarthiness 
Housing  a  reptile  blood  that  I  could  see 
Beneath  it,  like  hereditary  venom 
Out  of  old  human  swamps,  hardly  revealed 
Itself  the  proper  spawning-ground  of  pity. 
But  so  it  was.     Pity,  or  something  like  it, 
Was  in  the  poison  of  his  proximity; 
[22] 


For  nothing  else  that  I  have  any  name  for 
Could  have  invaded  and  so  mastered  me 
With  a  slow  tolerance  that  eventually 
Assumed  a  blind  ascendency  of  custom 
That  saw  not  even  itself.     When  I  came  in, 
Often  I'd  find  him  strewn  along  my  couch 
Like  an  amorphous  lizard  with  its  clothes  on, 
Reading  a  book  and  waiting  for  its  dinner. 
His  clothes  were  always  odiously  in  order, 
Yet  I  should  not  have  thought  of  him  as  clean  — 
Not  even  if  he  had  washed  himself  to  death 
Proving  it.     There  was  nothing  right  about  him. 
Then  he  would  search,  never  quite  satisfied, 
Though  always  in  a  measure  confident, 
My  eyes  to  find  a  welcome  waiting  in  them, 
Unwilling,  as  I  see  him  now,  to  know 
That  it  would  never  be  there.     Looking  back, 
F231 


I  am  not  sure  that  he  would  not  have  died 
For  me,  if  I  were  drowning  or  on  fire, 
Or  that  I  would  not  rather  have  let  myself 
Die  twice  than  owe  the  debt  of  my  survival 
To  him,  though  he  had  lost  not  even  his  clothes. 
No,  there  was  nothing  right  about  that  fellow; 
And  after  twenty  years  to  think  of  him 
I  should  be  quite  as  helpless  now  to  serve  him 
As  I  was  then.     I  mean  —  without  my  story. 
Be  patient,  and  you'll  see  just  what  I  mean  — 
Which  is  to  say,  you  won't.     But  you  can  listen, 
And  that's  itself  a  large  accomplishment 
Uncrowned;  and  may  be,  at  a  time  like  this, 
A  mighty  charity.     It  was  in  January 
This  evil  genius  came  into  our  school, 
And  it  was  June  when  he  went  out  of  it  — 
If  I  may  say  that  he  was  wholly  out 
[24] 


Of  any  place  that  I  was  in  thereafter. 

But  he  was  not  yet  gone.     When  we  are  told 

By  Fate  to  bear  what  we  may  never  bear, 

Fate  waits  a  little  while  to  see  what  happens; 

And  this  time  it  was  only  for  the  season 

Between  the  swift  midwinter  holidays 

And  the  long  progress  into  weeks  and  months 

Of  all  the  days  that  followed  —  with  him  there 

To  make  them  longer.     I   would  have   given   an 

eye, 

Before  the  summer  came,  to  know  for  certain 
That  I  should  never  be  condemned  again 
To  see  him  with  the  other;  and  all  the  while 
There  was  a  battle  going  on  within  me 
Of  hate  that  fought  remorse  —  if  you  must  have 

it  — 

Never  to  win,  .  .  .  never  to  win  but  once, 
[25] 


And  having  won,  to  lose  disastrously, 
And  as  it  was  to  prove,  interminably  — 
Or  till  an  end  of  living  may  annul, 
If  so  it  be,  the  nameless  obligation 
That  I  have  not  the  Christian  revenue 
In  me  to  pay.     A  man  who  has  no  gold, 
Or  an  equivalent,  shall  pay  no  gold 
Until  by  chance  or  labor  or  contrivance 
He  makes  it  his  to  pay;  and  he  that  has 
No  kindlier  commodity  than  hate, 
Glossed  with  a  pity  that  belies  itself 
In  its  negation  and  lacks  alchemy 
To  fuse  itself  to  —  love,  would  you  have  me  say? 
I  don't  believe  it.     No,  there  is  no  such  word. 
If  I  say  tolerance,  there's  no  more  to  say. 
And  he  who  sickens  even  in  saying  that  — 
What  coin  of  God  has  he  to  pay  the  toll 
[26J 


To  peace  on  earth  ?     Good  will  to  men  —  oh,  yes ! 
That's  easy;  and  it  means  no  more  than  sap, 
Until  we  boil  the  water  out  of  it 
Over  the  fire  of  sacrifice.     I'll  do  it; 
And  in  a  measurable  way  I've  done  it  — 
But  not  for  him.     What  are  you  smiling  at? 
Well,  so  it  went  until  a  day  in  June. 
We  were  together  under  an  old  elm, 
Which  now,  I  hope,  is  gone  —  though  it's  a  crime 
In  me  that  I  should  have  to  wish  the  death 
Of  such  a  tree  as  that.     There  were  no  trees 
Like  those  that  grew  at  school  —  until  he  came. 
We  stood  together  under  it  that  day, 
When  he,  by  some  ungovernable  chance, 
All  foreign  to  the  former  crafty  care 
That  he  had  used  never  to  cross  my  favor, 
Told  of  a  lie  that  stained  a  friend  of  mine 
[27] 


With  a  false  blot  that  a  few  days  washed  off. 

A  trifle  now,  but  a  boy's  honor  then  — 

Which    then    was    everything.     There    were    some 

words 

Between  us,  but  I  don't  remember  them. 
All  I  remember  is  a  bursting  flood 
Of  half  a  year's  accumulated  hate, 
And  his  incredulous  eyes  before  I  struck  him. 
He  had  gone  once  too  far;  and  when  he  knew  it, 
He  knew  it  was  all  over;  and  I  struck  him. 
Pound  for  pound,  he  was  the  better  brute; 
But  bulking  in  the  way  then  of  my  fist 
And  all  there  was  alive  in  me  to  drive  it, 
Three  of  him  misbegotten  into  one 
Would    have    gone    down    like    him  —  and    being 

larger, 

Might  have  bled  more,  if  that  were  necessary. 
[28] 


He  came  up  soon;  and  if  I  live  for  ever, 

The  vengeance  in  his  eyes,  and  a  weird  gleam 

Of  desolation  —  if  I  make  you  see  it  — 

Will  be  before  me  as  it  is  tonight. 

I  shall  not  ever  know  how  long  it  was 

I  waited  his  attack  that  never  came; 

It  might  have  been  an  instant  or  an  hour 

That  I  stood  ready  there,  watching  his  eyes, 

And  the  tears  running  out  of  them.     They  made 

Me  sick,  those  tears;  for  I  knew,  miserably, 

They  were  not  there  for  any  pain  he  felt. 

I  do  not  think  he  felt  the  pain  at  all. 

He  felt  the  blow.  .  .  .  Oh,  the  whole  thing  was 

bad- 

So  bad  that  even  the  bleaching  suns  and  rains 
Of  years  that  wash  away  to  faded  lines, 
Or  blot  out  wholly,  the  sharp  wrongs  and  ills 
[291 


Of  youth,  have  had  no  cleasing  agent  in  them 
To  dim  the  picture.     I  still  see  him  going 
Away  from  where  I  stood;  and  I  shall  see  him 
Longer,  sometime,  than  I  shall  see  the  face 
Of  whosoever  watches  by  the  bed 
On  which  I  die  —  given  I  die  that  way. 
I  doubt  if  he  could  reason  his  advantage 
In  living  any  longer  after  that 
Among  the  rest  of  us.     The  lad  he  slandered, 
Or  gave  a  negative  immunity 
No  better  than  a  stone  he  might  have  thrown 
Behind  him  at  his  head,  was  of  the  few 
I  might  have  envied;  and  for  that  being  known, 
My  fury  became  sudden  history, 
And  I  a  sudden  hero.     But  the  crown 
I  wore  was  hot;  and  I  would  happily 
Have  hurled  it,  if  I  could,  so  far  away 
[30] 


That  over  my  last  hissing  glimpse  of  it 

There    might    have    closed    an    ocean.     He    went 

home 

The  next  day,  and  the  same  unhappy  chance 
That  first  had  fettered  me  and  my  aversion 
To  his  unprofitable  need  of  me 
Brought  us  abruptly  face  to  face  again 
Beside  the  carriage  that  had  come  for  him. 
We  met,  and  for  a  moment  we  were  still  — 
Together.     But  I  was  reading  in  his  eyes 
More  than  I  read  at  college  or  at  law 
In     years     that     followed.     There     was     blankly 

nothing 

For  me  to  say,  if  not  that  I  was  sorry; 
And  that  was  more  than  hate  would  let  me  say  — 
Whatever  the  truth  might  be.     At  last  he  spoke, 
And  I  could  see  the  vengeance  in  his  eyes, 
[31] 


And  a  cold  sorrow  —  which,  if  I  had  seen 
Much  more  of  it  might  yet  have  mastered  me. 
But  I  would  see  no  more  of  it.     '  Well,  then,' 
He  said,  '  have  you  thought  yet  of  anything 
Worth  saying?     If  so,  there's  time.     If  you  are 

silent, 

I  shall  know  where  you  are  until  you  die.' 
I  can  still  hear  him  saying  those  words  to  me 
Again,  without  a  loss  or  an  addition; 
I  know,  for  I  have  heard  them  ever  since. 
And  there  was  in  me  not  an  answer  for  them 
Save  a  new  roiling  silence.     Once  again 
I  met  his  look,  and  on  his  face  I  saw 
There  was  a  twisting  in  the  swarthiness 
That  I  had  often  sworn  to  be  the  cast 
Of  his  ophidian  mind.     He  had  no  soul. 
There  was  to  be  no  more  of  him  —  not  then. 
[32] 


The  carriage  rolled  away  with  him  inside, 

Leaving  the  two  of  us  alive  together 

In  the  same  hemisphere  to  hate  each  other. 

I  don't  know  now  whether  he's  here  alive, 

Or  whether  he's  here  dead.     But  that,  of  course, 

As  you  would  say,  is  only  a  tired  man's  fancy. 

You  know  that  I  have  driven  the  wheels  too  fast 

Of  late,  and  all  for  gold  I  do  not  need. 

When  are  we  mortals  to  be  sensible, 

Paying  no  more  for  life  than  life  is  worth? 

Better  for  us,  no  doubt,  we  do  not  know 

How  much  we  pay  or  what  it  is  we  buy." 

He  waited,  gazing  at  me  as  if  asking 

The  worth  of  what  the  universe  had  for  sale 

For  one  confessed  remorse.     Avon,  I  knew, 

Had  driven  the  wheels  too  fast,  but  not  for  gold. 


33] 


"  If  you  had  given  him  then  your  hand."  I  said, 

"  And  spoken,  though  it  strangled  you,  the  truth, 

I  should  not  have  the  melancholy  honor 

Of  sitting  here  alone  with  you  this  evening. 

If  only  you  had  shaken  hands  with  him, 

And  said  the  truth,  he  would  have  gone  his  way, 

And  you  your  way.     He  might  have  wished  you 

dead, 

But  he  would  not  have  made  you  miserable. 
At  least,"  I  added,  indefensibly, 
"  That's  what  I  hope  is  true." 

He  pitied  me, 

But  had  the  magnanimity  not  to  say  so. 
"  If  only  we  had  shaken  hands,"  he  said, 
"  And  I  had  said  the  truth,  we  might  have  been 
In  half  a  moment  rolling  on  the  gravel. 
[34] 


If  I  had  said  the  truth,  I  should  have  said 

That  never  at  any  moment  on  the  clock 

Above  us  in  the  tower  since  his  arrival 

Had  I  been  in  a  more  proficient  mood 

To  throttle  him.     If  you  had  seen  his  eyes 

As  I  did,  and  if  you  had  seen  his  face 

At  work  as  I  did,  you  might  understand. 

I  was  ashamed  of  it,  as  I  am  now. 

But  that's  the  prelude  to  another  theme; 

For  now  I'm  saying  only  what  had  happened 

If  I  had  taken  his  hand  and  said  the  truth. 

The  wise  have  cautioned  us  that  where  there's  hate 

There's  also  fear.     The  wise  are  right  sometimes. 

There  may  be  now,  but  there  was  no  fear  then. 

There  was  just  hatred,  hauled  up  out  of  hell 

For  me  to  writhe  in;  and  I  writhed  in  it." 

[35] 


I  saw  that  he  was  writhing  in  it  still; 
But  having  a  magnanimity  myself, 
I  waited.     There  was  nothing  else  to  do 
But  wait,  and  to  remember  that  his  tale, 
Though  nearly  done,  as  I  divined  it  was, 
Yet  hovered  among  shadows  and  regrets 
Of  twenty  years  ago.     When  he  began 
Again  to  speak,  I  felt  them  coming  nearer. 

"  Whenever  your  poet  or  your  philosopher 
Has  nothing  richer  for  us,"  he  resumed, 
"  He  burrows  among  remnants,  like  a  mouse 
In  a  waste-basket,  and  with  much  dry  noise 
Comes  up  again,  having  found  Time  at  the  bottom 
And  filled  himself  with  its  futility. 
'  Time  is  at  once,'  he  says,  to  startle  us, 
'  A  poison  for  us,  if  we  make  it  so, 
[36] 


And,  if  we  make  it  so,  an  antidote 

For  the  same  poison  that  afflicted  us.' 

I'm  witness  to  the  poison,  but  the  cure 

Of  my  complaint  is  not,  for  me,  in  Time. 

There  may  be  doctors  in  eternity 

To  deal  with  it,  but  they  are  not  here  now. 

There's  no  specific  for  my  three  diseases 

That  I  could  swallow,  even  if  I  should  find  it, 

And  I  shall  never  find  it  here  on  earth." 

"  Mightn't  it  be  as  well,  my  friend,"  I  said 
"  For  you  to  contemplate  the  uncompleted 
With  not  such  an  infernal  certainty?  " 

"  And  mightn't  it  be  as  well  for  you,  my  friend," 
Said  Avon,  "  to  be  quiet  while  I  go  on? 
When  I  am  done,  then  you  may  talk  all  night  — 
[371 


Like  a  physician  who  can  do  no  good, 
But  knows  how  soon  another  would  have  his  fee 
Were  he  to  tell  the  truth.     Your  fee  for  this 
Is  in  my  gratitude  and  my  affection; 
And  I'm  not  eager  to  be  calling  in 
Another  to  take  yours  away  from  you, 
Whatever  it's  worth.     I  like  to  think  I  know. 
Well  then,  again.     The  carriage  rolled  away 
With  him  inside;  and  so  it  might  have  gone 
For  ten  years  rolling  on,  with  him  still  in  it, 
For  all  it  was  I  saw  of  him.     Sometimes 
I  heard  of  him,  but  only  as  one  hears 
Of  leprosy  in  Boston  or  New  York 
And  wishes  it  were  somewhere  else.     He  faded 
Out  of  my  scene  —  yet  never  quite  out  of  it : 
'  I  shall  know  where  you  are  until  you  die,' 
Were  his  last  words ;  and  they  are  the  same  words 
[38] 


That  I  received  thereafter  once  a  year, 
Infallibly  on  my  birthday,  with  no  name; 
Only  a  card,  and  the  words  printed  on  it. 
No,  I  was  never  rid  of  him  —  not  quite ; 
Although  on  shipboard,  on  my  way  from  here 
To  Hamburg,  I  believe  that  I  forgot  him. 
But  once  ashore,  I  should  have  been  half  ready 
To  meet  him  there,  risen  up  out  of  the  ground, 
With  hoofs  and  horns  and  tail  and  everything. 
Believe  me,  there  was  nothing  right  about  him, 
Though  it  was  not  in  Hamburg  that  I  found  him. 
Later,  in  Rome,  it  was  we  found  each  other, 
For  the  first  time  since  we  had  been  at  school. 
There  was  the  same  slow  vengeance  in  his  eyes 
When  he  saw  mine,  and  there  was  a  vicious  twist 
On  his  amphibious  face  that  might  have  been 
On  anything  else  a  smile  —  rather  like  one 
[39] 


We  look  for  on  the  stage  than  in  the  street. 
I  must  have  been  a  yard  away  from  him 
Yet  as  we  passed  I  felt  the  touch  of  him 
Like  that  of  something  soft  in  a  dark  room. 
There's    hardly    need    of    saying    that    we    said 

nothing, 

Or  that  we  gave  each  other  an  occasion 
For  more  than  our  eyes  uttered.     He  was  gone 
Before  I  knew  it,  like  a  solid  phantom; 
And  his  reality  was  for  me  some  time 
In  its  achievement  —  given  that  one's  to  be 
Convinced  that  such  an  incubus  at  large 
Was  ever  quite  real.     The  season  was  upon  us 
When  there  are  fitter  regions  in  the  world  — 
Though    God    knows    he    would    have    been    safe 

enough  — 

Than  Rome  for  strayed  Americans  to  live  in, 
[40] 


And  when  the  whips  of  their  itineraries 
Hurry  them  north  again.     I  took  my  time, 
Since  I  was  paying  for  it,  and  leisurely 
Went  where  I  would  —  though  never  again  to  move 
Without  him  at  my  elbow  or  behind  me. 
My  shadow  of  him,  wherever  I  found  myself 
Might  horribly  as  well  have  been  the  man  — 
Although  I  should  have  been  afraid  of  him 
No  more  than  of  a  large  worm  in  a  salad. 
I  should  omit  the  salad,  certainly, 
And  wish  the  worm  elsewhere.     And  so  he  was, 
In  fact;  yet  as  I  go  on  to  grow  older, 
I  question  if  there's  anywhere  a  fact 
That  isn't  the  malevolent  existence 
Of  one  man  who  is  dead,  or  is  not  dead, 
Or  what  the  devil  it  is  that  he  may  be. 
There  must  be,  I  suppose,  a  fact  somewhere, 
[41] 


But  I  don't  know  it.     I  can  only  tell  you 
That  later,  when  to  all  appearances 
I  stood  outside  a  music-hall  in  London, 
I  felt  him  and  then  saw  that  he  was  there. 
Yes,  he  was  there,  and  had  with  him  a  woman 
Who  looked  as  if  she  didn't  know.     I'm  sorry 
To  this  day  for  that  woman  —  who,  no  doubt, 
Is  doing  well.     Yes,  there  he  was  again; 
There  were  his  eyes  and  the  same  vengeance  in 

them 

That  I  had  seen  in  Rome  and  twice  before  — 
Not  mentioning  all  the  time,  or  most  of  it, 
Between  the  day  I  struck  him  and  that  evening. 
That  was  the  worst  show  that  I  ever  saw, 
But  you  had  better  see  it  for  yourself 
Before  you  say  so  too.     I  went  away, 
Though  not  for  any  fear  that  I  could  feel 
[42] 


Of  him  or  of  his  worst  manipulations, 
But  only  to  be  out  of  the  same  air 
That  made  him  stay  alive  in  the  same  world 
With  all  the  gentlemen  that  were  in  irons 
For  uncommendable  extravagances 
That  I  should  reckon  slight  compared  with  his 
Offence  of  being.     Distance  would  have  made  him 
A  moving  fly-speck  on  the  map  of  life, — 
But  he  would  not  be  distant,  though  his  flesh 
And  bone  might  have  been  climbing  Fujiyama 
Or  Chimborazo  —  with  me  there  in  London, 
Or  sitting  here.     My  doom  it  was  to  see  him, 
Be  where  I  might.     That  was  ten  years  ago; 
And  having  waited  season  after  season 
His  always  imminent  evil  recrudescence, 
And  all  for  nothing,  I  was  waiting  still, 
When  the  Titanic  touched  a  piece  of  ice 
[43] 


And  we  were  for  a  moment  where  we  are, 

With  nature  laughing  at  us.     When  the  noise 

Had  spent  itself  to  names,  his  was  among  them; 

And  I  will  not  insult  you  or  myself 

With  a  vain  perjury.     I  was  far  from  cold. 

It  seemed  as  for  the  first  time  in  my  life 

I  knew  the  blessedness  of  being  warm; 

And  I  remember  that  I  had  a  drink, 

Having  assuredly  no  need  of  it. 

And  after  that  there  were  no  messages 

In  ambush  waiting  for  me  on  my  birthday. 

There  was  no  vestige  yet  of  any  fear, 

You  understand  —  if  that's  why  you  are  smiling." 

I  said  that  I  had  not  so  much  as  whispered 

The  name  aloud  of  any  fear  soever, 

And  that  I  smiled  at  his  unwonted  plunge 

[4*1 


Into  the  perilous  pool  of  Dionysus. 

"Well,  if  you  are  so  easily  diverted 

As  that/'  he  said,  drumming  his  chair  again, 

"  You  will  be  pleased,  I  think,  with  what  is  coming; 

And  though  there  be  divisions  and  departures, 

Imminent  from  now  on,  for  your  diversion 

I'll  do  the  best  I  can.     More  to  the  point, 

I  know  a  man  who  if  his  friends  were  like  him 

Would  live  in  the  woods  all  summer  and  all  winter, 

Leaving  the  town  and  its  iniquities 

To  die  of  their  own  dust.     But  having  his  wits, 

Henceforth  he  may  conceivably  avoid 

The  adventure  unattended.     Last  October 

He  took  me  with  him  into  the  Maine  woods, 

Where,  by  the  shore  of  a  primeval  lake, 

With  woods  all  round  it,  and  a  voyage  away 


[45 


From    anything    wearing   clothes,    he    had    reared 

somehow 

A  lodge,  or  camp,  with  a  stone  chimney  in  it, 
And  a  wide  fireplace  to  make  men  forget 
Their  sins  who  sat  before  it  in  the  evening, 
Hearing  the  wind  outside  among  the  trees 
And  the  black  water  washing  on  the  shore. 
I  never  knew  the  meaning  of  October 
Until  I  went  with  Asher  to  that  place, 
Which  I  shall  not  investigate  again 
Till  I  be  taken  there  by  other  forces 
Than  are  innate  in  my  economy. 
'  You  may  not  like  it,'  Asher  said,  '  but  Asher 
Knows  what  is  good.     So  put  your  faith  in  Asher, 
And  come  along  with  him/     He's  an  odd  bird, 
Yet  I  could  wish  for  the  world's  decency 
There  might  be  more  of  him.     And  so  it  was 
[46] 


I  found  myself.,  at  first  incredulous, 
Down  there  with  Asher  in  the  wilderness, 
Alive  at  last  with  a  new  liberty 
And  with  no  sore  to  fester.     He  perceived 
In  me  an  altered  favor  of  God's  works, 
And  promptly  took  upon  himself  the  credit, 
Which,  in  a  fashion,  was  as  accurate 
As  one's  interpretation  of  another 
Is  like  to  be.     So  for  a  frosty  fortnight 
We  had  the  sunlight  with  us  on  the  lake, 
And  the  moon  with  us  when  the  sun  was  down. 
'  God  gave  his  adjutants  a  holiday,' 
Asher  assured  me,  '  when  He  made  this  place  ' 
And  I  agreed  with  him  that  it  was  heaven, — 
Till  it  was  hell  for  me  for  then  and  after. 
There  was  a  village  miles  away  from  us 
Where  now  and  then  we  paddled  for  the  mail 
[47] 


And  incidental  small  commodities 
That  perfect  exile  might  require,  and  stayed 
The  night  after  the  voyage  with  an  antique 
Survival  of  a  broader  world  than  ours 
Whom  Asher  called  The  Admiral.     This  time, 
A  little  out  of  sorts  and  out  of  tune 
With  paddling,  I  let  Asher  go  alone, 
Sure  that  his  heart  was  happy.     Then  it  was 
That  hell  came.     I  sat  gazing  over  there 
Across  the  water,  watching  the  sun's  last  fire 
Above  those  gloomy  and  indifferent  trees 
That  might  have  been  a  wall  around  the  world, 
When  suddenly,  like  faces  over  the  lake, 
Out  of  the  silence  of  that  other  shore 
I  was  aware  of  hidden  presences 
That   soon,   no  matter  how  many   of   them  there 
were, 

[48] 


Would  all  be  one.     I  could  not  look  behind  me, 
Where  I  could  hear  that  one  of  them  was  breathing, 
For,  if  I  did,  those  others  over  there 
Might  all  see  that  at  last  I  was  afraid; 
And  I  might  hear  them  without  seeing  them, 
Hearing  that  other  one.     You  were  not  there; 
And  it  is  well  for  you  that  you  don't  know 
What  they  are  like  when  they  should  not  be  there. 
And  there  were  chilly  doubts  of  whether  or  not 
I  should  be  seeing  the  rest  that  I  should  see 
With  eyes,  or  otherwise.     I  could  not  be  sure; 
And  as  for  going  over  to  find  out, 
All  I  may  tell  you  now  is  that  my  fear 
Was  not  the  fear  of  dying,  though  I  knew  soon 
That  all  the  gold  in  all  the  sunken  ships 
That  have  gone  down  since  Tyre  would  not  have 
paid 

[49] 


For  me  the  ferriage  of  myself  alone 
To  that  infernal  shore.     I  was  in  hell, 
Remember;  and  if  you  have  never  been  there 
You  may  as  well  not  say  how  easy  it  is 
To  find  the  best  way  out.     There  may  not  be  one. 
Well,  I  was  there;  and  I  was  there  alone  — 
Alone  for  the  first  time  since  I  was  born; 
And  I  was  not  alone.     That's  what  it  is 
To  be  in  hell.     I  hope  you  will  not  go  there. 
All  through  that  slow,  long,  desolating  twilight 
Of  incoherent  certainties,  I  waited; 
Never  alone  —  never  to  be  alone; 
And  while  the  night  grew  down  upon  me  there, 
I  thought  of  old  Prometheus  in  the  story 
That  I  had  read  at  school,  and  saw  mankind 
All  huddled  into  clusters  in  the  dark, 
Calling  to  God  for  light.     There  was  a  light 
[50] 


Coming  for  them,  but  there  was  none  for  me 
Until  a  shapeless  remnant  of  a  moon 
Rose  after  midnight  over  the  black  trees 
Behind  me.     I  should  hardly  have  confessed 
The  heritage  then  of  my  identity 
To  my  own  shadow;  for  I  was  powerless  there, 
As  I  am  here.     Say  what  you  like  to  say 
To  silence,  but  say  none  of  it  to  me 
Tonight.     To  say  it  now  would  do  no  good, 
And  you  are  here  to  listen.     Beware  of  hate, 
And  listen.     Beware  of  hate,  remorse,  and  fear, 
And  listen.     You  are  staring  at  the  damned, 
But  yet  you  are  no  more  the  one  than  he 
To  say  that  it  was  he  alone  who  planted 
The  flower  of  death  now  growing  in  his  garden. 
Was  it  enough,  I  wonder,  that  I  struck  him? 
I  shall  say  nothing.     I  shall  have  to  wait 
[51] 


Until  I  see  what's  coming,  if  it  comes, 
When  I'm  a  delver  in  another  garden  — 
If  such  an  one  there  be.     If  there  be  none, 
All's  well  —  and  over.     Rather  a  vain  expense, 
One  might  affirm  —  yet  there  is  nothing  lost. 
Science  be  praised  that  there  is  nothing  lost." 

I'm  glad  the  venom  that  was  on  his  tongue 
May  not  go  down  on  paper;  and  I'm  glad 
No  friend  of  mine  alive,  far  as  I  know, 
Has  a  tale  waiting  for  me  with  an  end 
Like  Avon's.     There  was  here  an  interruption, 
Though  not  a  long  one  —  only  the  while  we  heard, 
As  we  had  heard  before,  the  ghost  of  steps 
Faintly  outside.     We  knew  that  she  was  there 
Again;  and  though  it  was  a  kindly  folly, 
I  wished  that  Avon's  wife  would  go  to  sleep. 
[52] 


"  I  was  afraid,  this  time,  but  not  of  man  — 
Or  man  as  you  may  figure  him/'  he  said. 
"  It  was  not  anything  my  eyes  had  seen 
That  I  could  feel  around  me  in  the  night, 
There  by  that  lake.     If  I  had  been  alone, 
There  would  have  been  the  joy  of  being  free, 
Which  in  imagination  I  had  won 
With  unimaginable  expiation  — 
But  I  was  not  alone.     If  you  had  seen  me, 
Waiting  there  for  the  dark  and  looking  off 
Over  the  gloom  of  that  relentless  water, 
Which  had  the  stillness  of  the  end  of  things 
That  evening  on  it,  I  might  well  have  made 
For  you  the  picture  of  the  last  man  left 
Where  God,  in  his  extinction  of  the  rest, 
Had  overlooked  him  and  forgotten  him. 
Yet  I  was  not  alone.     Interminably 
[53] 


The  minutes  crawled  along  and  over  me, 

Slow,  cold,  intangible,  and  invisible, 

As  if  they  had  come  up  out  of  that  water. 

How  long  I  sat  there  I  shall  never  know, 

For  time  was  hidden  out  there  in  the  black  lake, 

Which  now  I  could  see  only  as  a  glimpse 

Of  black  light  by  the  shore.     There  were  no  stars 

To  mention,  and  the  moon  was  hours  away 

Behind  me.     There  was  nothing  but  myself, 

And  what  was  coming.     On  my  breast  I  felt 

The  touch  of  death,  and  I  should  have  died  then. 

I  ruined  good  Asher's  autumn  as  it  was, 

For  he  will  never  again  go  there  alone, 

If  ever  he  goes  at  all.     Nature  did  ill 

To  darken  such  a  faith  in  her  as  his, 

Though  he  will  have  it  that  I  had  the  worst 

Of  her  defection,  and  will  hear  no  more 

[54] 


Apologies.     If  it  had  to  be  for  someone, 

I  think  it  well  for  me  it  was  for  Asher. 

I  dwell  on  him,  meaning  that  you  may  know  him 

Before  your  last  horn  blows.     He  has  a  name 

That's  like  a  tree,  and  therefore  like  himself  — 

By  which  I  mean  you  find  him  where  you  leave 

him. 

I  saw  him  and  The  Admiral  together 
While  I  was  in  the  dark,  but  they  were  far  — 
Far  as  around  the  world  from  where  I  was; 
And  they  knew  nothing  of  what  I  saw  not 
While  I  knew  only  I  was  not  alone. 
I  made  a  fire  to  make  the  place  alive, 
And  locked  the  door.     But  even  the  fire  was  dead, 
And  all  the  life  there  was  was  in  the  shadow 
It  made  of  me.     My  shadow  was  all  of  me; 
The  rest  had  had  its  day,  and  there  was  night 
[551 


Remaining  —  only       night,       that's       made       for 

shadows, 

Shadows  and  sleep  and  dreams,  or  dreams  with 
out  it. 

The  fire  went  slowly  down,  and  now  the  moon, 
Or  that  late  wreck  of  it,  was  coming  up; 
And  though  it  was  a  martyr's  work  to  move, 
I  must  obey  my  shadow,  and  I  did. 
There  were  two  beds  built  low  against  the  wall, 
And  down  on  one  of  them,  with  all  my  clothes  on, 
Like  a  man  getting  into  his  own  grave, 
I  lay  —  and  waited.     As  the  firelight  sank, 
The  moonlight,  which  had  partly  been  consumed 
By  the  black  trees,  framed  on  the  other  wall 
A  glimmering  window  not  far  from  the  ground. 
The  coals  were  going,  and  only  a  few  sparks 
Were  there  to  tell  of  them;  and  as  they  died 
[56] 


The  window  lightened,  and  I  saw  the  trees. 
They  moved  a  little,  but  I  could  not  move, 
More  than  to  turn  my  face  the  other  way; 
And  then,  if  you  must  have  it  so,  I  slept. 
We'll  call  it  so  —  if  sleep  is  your  best  name 
For  a  sort  of  conscious,  frozen  catalepsy 
Wherein  a  man  sees  all  there  is  around  him 
As  if  it  were  not  real,  and  he  were  not 
Alive.     You  may  call  it  anything  you  please 
That  made  me  powerless  to  move  hand  or  foot, 
Or  to  make  any  other  living  motion 
Than  after  a  long  horror,  without  hope, 
To  turn  my  face  again  the  other  way. 
Some  force  that  was  not  mine  opened  my  eyes, 
And,  as  I  knew  it  must  be, —  it  was  there." 


[57] 


Avon  covered  his   eyes  —  whether  to  shut 

The  memory  and  the  sight  of  it  away, 

Or  to  be  sure  that  mine  were  for  the  moment 

Not  searching  his  with  pity,  is  now  no  matter. 

My  glance  at  him  was  brief,  turning  itself 

To  the  familiar  pattern  of  his  rug, 

Wherein  I  may  have  sought  a  consolation  — 

As  one  may  gaze  in  sorrow  on  a  shell, 

Or  a  small  apple.     So  it  had  come,  I  thought; 

And  heard,  no  more  with  any  wonderment, 

The  faint  recurring  footsteps  of  his  wife, 

Who,  knowing  less  than  I  knew,  yet  knew  more. 

Now  I  could  read,  I  fancied,  through  the  fear 

That  latterly  was  living  in  her  eyes, 

To  the  sure  source  of  its  authority. 

But  he  went  on,  and  I  was  there  to  listen: 

[58] 


"  And  though  I  saw  it  only  as  a  blot 

Between  me  and  my  life,  it  was  enough 

To  make  me  know  that  he  was  watching  there  — 

Waiting  for  me  to  move,  or  not  to  move, 

Before  he  moved.     Sick  as  I  was  with  hate, 

Reborn,  and  chained  with  fear  that  was  more  than 

fear, 

I  would  have  gambled  all  there  was  to  gain 
Or  lose  in  rising  there  from  where  I  lay 
And  going  out  after  it.     '  Before  the  dawn,' 
I  reasoned,  '  that  will  be  a  difference  here. 
Therefore  it  may  as  well  be  done  outside/ 
And  then  I  found  I  was  immovable, 
As  I  had  been  before;  and  a  dead  sweat 
Rolled  out  of  me  as  I  remembered  him 
When  I  had  seen  him  leaving  me  at  school. 
'  I  shall  know  where  you  are  until  you  die/ 
[59] 


Were  the  last  words  that  I  had  heard  him  say; 
And  there  he  was.     Now  I  could  see  his  face, 
And  all  the  sad,  malignant  desperation 
That  was  drawn  on  it  after  I  had  struck  him, 
And  on  my  memory  since  that  afternoon. 
But  all  there  was  left  now  for  me  to  do 
Was  to  lie  there  and  see  him  while  he  squeezed 
His  unclean  outlines  into  the  dim  room, 
And  half  erect  inside,  like  a  still  beast 
With  a  face  partly  man's,  came  slowly  on 
Along  the  floor  to  the  bed  where  I  lay, 
And  waited.     I  had  waited  for  so  long 
That  I  began  to  fancy  there  was  on  me 
The  stupor  that  explorers  have  alleged 
As  evidence  of  nature's  final  mercy 
When  tigers  have  them  down  upon  the  earth 
And  wild  hot  breath  is  heavy  on  their  faces. 
[601 


I  could  not  feel  his  breath,  but  I  could  hear  it ; 

Though  fear  had  made  an  anvil  of  my  heart 

Where  demons,  for  the  joy  of  doing  it, 

Were  sledging  death  down  on  it.     And  I  saw 

His  eyes  now,  as  they  were,  for  the  first  time  — 

Aflame  as  they  had  never  been  before 

With    all    their    gathered    vengeance    gleaming    in 

them, 

And  always  that  unconscionable  sorrow 
That  would  not  die  behind  it.     Then  I  caught 
The  shadowy  glimpse  of  an  uplifted  arm, 
And  a  moon-flash  of  metal.     That  was  all.  .  .  . 

"  When  I  believed  I  was  alive  again 
I  was  with  Asher  and  The  Admiral, 
WThom  Asher  had  brought  with  him  for  a  day 
With  nature.     That's  about  the  whole  of  it, 
[61] 


Except  the  thing  there  on  the  dictionary. 
They  found  it  on  me  with  the  point  of  it 
Touching  my  throat.     I  had  not  moved  since  then ; 
And  it  was  not  for  some  uncertain  hours 
After  they  came  that  either  would  say  how  long 
That  might  have  been.     It  should  have  been  much 

longer. 

All  you  may  add  will  be  your  own  invention, 
For  I  have  told  you  all  there  is  to  tell. 
Tomorrow  I  shall  have  another  birthday, 
And  with  it  there  may  come  another  message  — 
Although  I  cannot  see  the  need  of  it. 
You  may  as  well  take  that  thing  home  with  you, 
And  so  be  sure  that  I'm  not  using  it. 
They    may    arrest    you,    but    good    night !  —  and 

thank  you." 

He  smiled,  but  I  would  rather  he  had  not. 
[62] 


I  wished  that  Avon's  wife  would  go  to  sleep, 
But  whether  she  found  sleep  that  night  or  not 
I  do  not  know.     I  was  awake  for  hours, 
Toiling  in  vain  to  let  myself  believe 
That  Avon's  apparition  was  a  dream, 
And  that  he  might  have  added,  for  romance, 
The  rest  of  it  which  I  had  taken  away 
For  reasons  not  in  Avon's  dictionary. 
But  each  recurrent  memory  of  his  eyes, 
And  of  the  man  himself  that  I  had  known 
So  long  and  well,  made  soon  of  all  my  toil 
An  evanescent  and  a  vain  evasion; 
And  it  was  half  as  in  expectancy 
That  I  obeyed  the  summons  of  his  wife 
A  little  before  dawn,  and  was  again 
With  Avon  in  the  room  where  I  had  left  him, 
But  not  with  the  same  Avon  I  had  left. 
[63] 


The  doctor,  an  august  authority, 

With  eminence  abroad  as  well  as  here, 

Looked  hard  at  me  as  if  I  were  the  doctor 

And  he  the  friend.     "  I  have  had  eyes  on  Avon 

For  more  than  half  a  year,"  he  said  to  me, 

"  And  I  have  wondered  often  what  it  was 

That  I  could  see  that  I  was  not  to  see. 

Though  he  was  in  the  chair  where  you  are  looking, 

I  told  his  wife  —  I  had  to  tell  her  something  — 

It  was  a  nightmare  and  an  aneurism; 

And  so,  or  partly  so,  111  say  it  was. 

The  last  without  the  first  will  be  enough 

For  the  newspapers  and  the  undertaker; 

Yet  if  we  doctors  were  not  all  immune 

From  death,  disease,  and  curiosity, 

My  diagnosis  would  be  sorry  for  me. 

He  died,  you  know,  because  he  was  afraid  — 

[64], 


And  he  had  been  afraid  for  a  long  time; 

And  we  who  knew  him  well  would  all  agree 

To  fancy  there  was  rather  more  than  fear. 

The  door  was  locked  inside  —  they  broke  it  in 

To  find  him  —  but  she  heard  him  when  it  came. 

There  are  no  signs  of  any  visitors, 

Or  need  of  them.     If  I  were  not  a  child 

Of  science,  I  should  say  it  was  the  devil. 

I  don't  believe  it  was  another  woman, 

And  surely  it  was  not  another  man." 


PRINTED   IN    THB   UNITED    STATES    OT   AMERICA 

[65] 


THIS   BOOK  IS  DUE  ON   THE   LAST  DATE 
STAMPED   BELOW 


RENEWED  BOOKS  ARE  SUBJECT  TO  IMMEDIATE 
RECALL 


LIBRARY,  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  DAVIS 

Book  Slip-35»n-7,'62(D296s4)458 


!6o?: 


Robinson,  E.A. 
Avon's  harvest, 


Call  Number: 

PS3535 

025 
A9 


PS3555 

02.5 

A9 


260722 


